Bombay HC dissolves marriage of couple who split 20 years ago

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court recently ended the 24-year-long marriage of a couple who had lived apart for two decades. A division bench of Amjad Sayed and Justice Suresh Gupte allowed an appeal filed by the husband and dissolved the marriage.

“Both parties have lived separately since (1998). The only contact they have had so far was through a few phone calls made before 2006,” said the judges. “Twenty years have elapsed since their separation during which there was no attempt to resume cohabitation. Their only son is now 23 years old and has lived apart from his father for over 20 years. Is there any sanctity or, for that matter, even semblance of a purpose left in continuing this legal tie? Is there any stake of either party or, for that matter, of the society in preserving this broken marriage? To our mind, the answer seems to be clear. It would be unjust not to sever the marital tie in the facts of the case. Justice, consistent with good conscience, demands that the marriage be dissolved,” the judges ruled.

The bench quashed a 2008 order of the family court that had refused to grant the husband’s plea for divorce on the ground that the wife had deserted him.

The man had filed a plea for divorce in 2006 on the grounds of desertion but it was dismissed by the family court. While the man claimed the wife had left the matrimonial home, she contended that she was forced to leave home.

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